


The Ancient, the Mighty and the Outcast

by Madoshi



Series: POI in English [3]
Category: Person of Interest (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Space, Gen, M/M, Space Opera, Very Distant Future, definitely Rinch in later chapters, maybe Root/Shaw in later chapters
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-12-16
Updated: 2016-01-09
Packaged: 2018-05-07 01:47:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 12,105
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5438951
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Madoshi/pseuds/Madoshi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In the distant future when humanoid and non-humanoid civilizations are counted in billions, the loss of any small or unsignificant world goes unnoticed.  No one cares... except one man.</p><p>Or, the space!AU where Reese is a cyborg, Root is a different kind of cyborg, Shaw is an alien, and Harold Finch is, as always, a species all by himself.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> My deepest gratitude to [JinkyO](http://archiveofourown.org/users/JinkyO/pseuds/JinkyO/works?fandom_id=287761), who graciously agreed to edit my attempts to write in English. Seriously, you are the best, and I can't emphasize it enough!  
> And, as always, to my beloved [Serinah](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Serinah/pseuds/Serinah), without whom I wouldn't be able to write this at all (and who puts up with my prepositions).
> 
> All the remaining mistakes are mine.

**Year 3751 Key time**

It looked like the whole planet was hell-bent on killing them. Ok, maybe just this part.

On screen, a sea of natives were trying to break down the door to the old weather tower. Under the streams of rain, and clouds of fog, their bodies seemed to blur and entwine, merging into a single murderous swarm. They made a diabolical picture to be sure, as their eyes glowed in the twilight with cold, yellow-green fire. They were a beautiful folk, the natives, with their nimble lizard-like bodies and violet, scaly skin. But not quite so beautiful when trying to murder you in a feat of desperate rage.

The water was coming down in sheets, which seemed to blaze with the blasts of their impulse guns. The fire was focused on the central door, and Reese estimated ten or twelve more minutes before it gave way. Or, alternately, it might short-circuit due to the water and moisture in the air, who knew. The electronics here weren’t exactly cutting edge. 

“Hey, Root, how are you doing?” he asked, not looking away from the screen.

It was mesmerising. During his time as a space trooper, people sometimes were unhappy with them — for different reasons — but he’d never seen such rage on a such a scale. The mob on the square underneath the Weather Tower was just a fraction of what was really going on. A whole, godforsaken, backwater planet that they had just pissed off. Never a boring day.

“My best, if your ancient bio-schemes can comprehend the concept,” Root snarled.

Root was rigging the Tower communication connections They’d lost their own devices several hours ago and were now out of contact with the Ship. Root was desperate. Reese could tell because her voice lost that mocking edge, and the usual insults she shot his way didn’t land.

“ETA?” John asked.

“Too fucking long if you keep pulling my pigtails.” Root tied her long hair in a messy bun and returned to work. “Oh, how I wish Shaw were here!”

“Me too,” Reese agreed heartily.

As far as best exit strategy calculations went, he have vastly preferred another skilled fighter at his side. Root was not bad with plasma pistols, being an augmented human, but the Sandorian was undeniably better — almost a match for Reese himself, with his integrated guns.

He caught himself wishing Finch were here too, instead of Root. It’s not that he doubted her, it was just that he knew Harold was so much better with everything remotely tech. And, more to the point, he was way better with the ancient tech. He had the Ship practically eating out of his hand, which was not a small feat.

But Finch was somewhere in orbit, unable to see them or to help before they established contact, and that was actually OK. If bad came to worse, at least Harold would be alright and could continue with his endeavour. Or their endeavour. Maybe Shaw would help him as soon she came to herself…

On the screen, the crowd cleared a small space in front of the tower door. Some dragged pieces of equipment to the clearing, and several especially frenzied and fast-moving locals started to assemble them. They were obviously unsure of what they were doing — or too enraged to think clearly — but John didn’t think a standard de-blockirator would take them long.

“They are going to crash our shields,” John said calmly. “Maybe a little faster?”

“Whiner,” Root replied. Then she joined a couple of wires, twisted some toggles, pushed a lever — and Finch’s face, bluish due to holographic interface, appeared above the console.

“Root!” he said urgently. “Is Mr. Reese with you? How are you?”

“We are all right,” John stepped into what he presumed was the transmitter’s area. Judging by the way Finch’s face relaxed a notch, he indeed saw John. “Well, for the moment. Sorry to lose your comms.”

“I’ll make you assemble one next time,” Finch promised dryly, with his usual precise inflections. John wondered when he had stopped considering the tone cold and disinterested.

“Aye, captain,” drawled Reese. “Anyway, we are in the old Weather Tower on the ground floor, you know the one? On the central square. Root triggered an ancient defense system that is keeping us safe for now, but I think it’s your usual bipolar shields, and they are going to take it down with the de-blockirator in about seven minutes or so.”

“And I don’t want to sound needy, Harry, but we’d be grateful for a lift up,” Root chirped in. “Or any other options, really.”

“I take it, your mission was a failure?” asked Finch.

“This time, yeah, probably,” John answered.

Finch adjusted his old-fashioned glasses. “Where is Swallow?”

Swallow was a light shuttle they used for descent because the Ship wasn’t anything you wanted to try to land on any planet ever. 

Root sighed. “I’m afraid there might be a problem. They grabbed it, drained its batteries and hauled it somewhere, we are not sure where. It should be still within the city, but…”

“I can use your signal as a proxy, beam her remotely and recharge,” Harold said, “after that you should be able to find her, but that’s it. I’m afraid you’ll have to make your way to her on your own.”

“That’s OK, Harold,” said John. “Make her wave us a hand, and we’ll run for it.”

“Will do. Sorry I can’t be of more sufficient help,” Finch answered stiffly.

They waited. John tried to look patient, if only to get to Root. She was pacing manically from one corner of the small room to the other, murmuring to herself and miraculously avoiding the cables and boards strewn across the floor — the innards of the gutted console. And then they heard it.

A large crack, a bang, as if something exploded in the distance. After that came screaming.

“Our cue!” Root exclaimed cheerfully. “Pack your guns, soldier boy.”


	2. Chapter 1

**Year 3747 Key time**

They say, there is no cold more bitter than the cold of outer space. But it’s not strictly true. Space has a relatively high temperature. It is the feeling of life leaving your body, with every particle of energy used on bio-support, that really makes you cold. In the dark, separated from the vastness and emptiness of outer space by only the laughably thin sheet of metal, you feel the tiniest increments.

Floating in the darkness of the prison chamber, Reese was quietly arranging his memories and experiences, tying some loose metaphorical ends. His batteries were not going to last till the end of the next 20-hour cycle. He didn’t have anything else to do. No plan of escape was viable and, he supposed, he didn’t really deserve to escape. The lives he took greatly outweighed the ones he saved, and, maybe, that’s why he was not given a worthy death. No flash, no bang, no dying in battle (any battle), not even an execution. Just this slow, imminent decay.

The big cell was empty, save lots and lots metallic and plastic spare parts adorned with pieces of partially mummified flesh, floating near the other walls, some still chained to them. Broken androids, left to rot. His captors thought Reese belonged to this selected company. He did not, not yet. But that moment was already in sight.

They say, your life passes before your eyes. What was his first memory? His best? His worst? He knew he never accomplished anything good, but maybe there was something he could at least be content with… There should be. His has lived long enough.

No sentient being wants to die in desperation. So Reese tried to find something that could bring him a modicum of solace... 

“Year 3740 Key time”, a voice said suddenly, clear and precise. A small light appeared in the pitch-black chamber, in the pile of garbage slowly rotating to the left from Reese. Maybe some of the long dead androids still had some juice left in them.

Except Reese remembered year 3745 very well, and there is no way anybody else could know…

“...you saved that man”, the voice continued, dropping each word with precise inflections like a goddamned radio-host. “He was beaten by the other villagers because he protected his daughter. You saved both of them, helped them find an escape route and gave them your water, risking a punishment from your command officer for wasting resources. That’s how I know that you accomplished at least something of significance.”

Reese was chained to the wall, which didn’t give him the best range of motion. Still, he tried his best, stretching out his body and his leg. He managed to rattle the pile, sending assorted pieces of android flying in different directions and disinterred the little glowing device — a small sphere approximately two inches in diameter. It didn’t rotate, it didn’t float. Actually, it didn’t move at all, as if not suspended in a weightless environment, but actually hanging on an invisible, rigid cord.

“How do you know that?” rasped Reese. “Did they make it to safety?”

He never told anybody about that year he spent among the troops “securing” a dusty, rocky and inhospitable planet not far from his homeworld. He didn’t even remember that time very well. He was freshly out of surgery, still adjusting to his new body. But he remembered that man and his daughter. He was about Reese’s age, she was incredibly young, a child. She wasn’t especially beautiful, but she had green eyes which were considered extremely good luck. Her father didn’t want her shipped off to marry a rich tradesman. Reese showed them a trail through the mountains. He was sure they’d met a gruesome death several days later, when the Mechinos descended from the sky and washed everything down in a massive torrent of destructive fire. No one could have escaped that.

But if they lived to tell their story...  
“I know exactly everything about you, Mr. Reese,” the sphere replied in an indifferent, monotonous voice. “Down to what was racing through your mind just now. And I don’t think you deserve to die on this godforsaken prison spaceship.”

“So what do I deserve according to you?” Reese growled, aiming his effort on the closest scrap of metal. His finer vision functions didn’t work, the ballistic computer was damaged, but his normal, biological sight was more or less okay. If he could kick it just so, maybe it would move this sphere whatever it was… How did this guy manage to smuggle it into the prison cell anyway? The other androids had been dead and gone long before Reese was put in here, and no lazy guard ever brought him any meals.

“A job,” was a simple answer.

“I had several of those,” John grunted.

At last he managed to touch the selected piece of garbage — a ruined ammunition-supply belt — and push it in the rough direction of the sphere. The piece slowly flew beside the sphere, hit the wall behind it, bounced back and with equal slowness, came to a stop.

“Not like this one, I don’t think,” the voice continued calmly. “I think everything that you ever aspired to is to help people. And by people I mean all sentient beings.”

Anyway, what was this device? John considered himself well-versed in different war and communication techs — a lifetime of tactical military employment tended to give you that sort of expertise. But this thing didn’t look Mechinos, or Arati, or Saiphor, or even Sandorian… it looked mostly like a toy, with shiny bits and pieces…

Wait, what?

“I’m a cyborg,” said John, a little amused despite the situation. His heart beat frantically, his auxiliary inner motors coming to life, body suddenly a little hot. “A soulless machine. And you tell me that I wanted to help people?”

“What is a machine if not a man’s creation, and what is a man if a not creation of other men?” said the voice. “I’m very good with the machines, Mr. Reese. But you are not one of them. Not completely, if you choose not to be.”

“What work are you talking about?” Reese asked.

“Saving planets,” the voice answered, deadly serious.


	3. Chapter 2

**Year 3751 Key time**

John never thought he’d live long enough to have something one could call “a comfortable routine”. Sure, during his hectic days as a gun for hire and even before that, when he worked for his planetary government, he had routines, lots. But he never took delight in any of them.

Strangely, here on the Ship, he started to look forward to mornings. The concept of a morning on a spaceship, travelling far from any stars, is not as fickle as one may think: people usually agree that morning is something that ends the night. Before Harold, before the Ship, John didn't anticipate the beginning of the next cycle. Now things had changed somehow, and he couldn’t put his finger on how it happened.

Despite his mostly artificial body, he did need some sleep. Not much, a few hours every couple of days. Sometimes he even managed to catch a stray dream or two.

Everyone else on the Ship slept though, even Root with her computer brain. So, nights were quiet and long, a time to untangle and sort his thoughts and work out the elusive connection between past and future. He usually checked and cleaned his guns, sorted his ammo, did some basic self-maintenance. Finch was an excellent mechanic, sure, but John preferred to do most day to day tasks by himself. 

It was not that he was shy to ask, if a need presented itself. He, however, remembered too well what happened last time when he was banged up enough that Finch had to patch him. Better not go there. Not now, at least.

Then, about 6 a. m., the Ship turned on the lights and Shaw went to the gym to exercise. All Sandorians exercised religiously, literally. For John a morning started when he heard her footsteps above his head; she lived on an “upper” level, at least when the Ship didn’t mix up her gravity vector. Again.

After that it was time for John to go to the galley, where he cooked breakfast for himself and Finch. The latter, if left to his own unimaginable devices, could forgo food altogether for a day or two. Shaw would never eat in public and never shared food with anyone (another religious thing). Root seemed not to eat at all. Finch once told John that she consumed super-rations because it was more efficient. No accounting for taste, he guessed. Personally, John would only eat those things at the threat of starvation, and _he_ could switch off his taste buds.

With his tray of eggs and coffee he went to the bridge, aka mad scientist library where Finch usually resided. Bear also slept there and always greeted John enthusiastically, tapping his tail and making attempts to lick John’s face. Finch would often say something to the effect of: “We should have never brought a dog aboard a spaceship, Mr. Reese; he lacks social interaction with his own kind.” And John would answer something like: “Well, he is one of the last dogs in the Galaxy, I doubt he’d find more social interaction elsewhere.” Or, alternately, Finch would remark on the poor state of canine manners. John didn’t mind Bear’s lack of reserve. It was nice to have a living being adore you so sincerely. Of course they didn’t have dogs on his native planet, but as a child he had his own raccal, a very friendly creature. It was killed during the Mechinos invasion, together with Reese’s extended family.

They ate, usually in companionable silence, or passed the time in mundane conversation. John sometimes updated Finch with the repair list, while Finch relayed the progress on their mission. The most important info was always how close they were to another planet that needed help. Space is mind-blowingly big, even if you have the Ship. Though Reese could only describe their primary mode of transportation as “magic”, they still spent most of their time between worlds. Weeks, sometimes months in the dark with a virtually unchanging picture on the screen. It could become quite taxing, but John found that he almost enjoyed these calm, long stretches of solitude and simple tasks. 

“We’ve managed to find a local curve, so we should catch the next planet in three days,” Finch said at breakfast that day.

“Sounds like you hit a jackpot,” John replied before taking another bite of his omelette.

Space being an enormous void, it normally takes a ship millennia to get from one star to another — any ship, even with the speed of light. But the catch is, if your mass is higher than zero, it is nearly impossible to reach that speed. And even if you could, you'd turn into pure energy and it is doubtful that you'd ever return to your original state. Most ships are capable of squeezing out only a fraction of light speed, meaning, they can spend billions of years traveling through just one galaxy while the others remained virtually unreachable.

Fortunately, as John was taught at school ages ago, God is charitable and where he seems to close a door, he opens a window. Space, as people of technologically advanced civilizations came to know it, consisted mostly of anomalies, both gravitational and completely mysterious. But you don’t need to understand something in order to use it. Most ships were able to exploit these anomalies. This allowed to take short-cuts worth thousands of lightyears and rendered space travels not only possible in a single life span but quite normal for most civilizations above certain technical (or biological) levels. 

John had served on different spaceships and worked with many navigators and pilots, some of them brilliant. He never met one quite as astonishing as Harold Finch. He was not sure how much of his genius was due to insane advancements of the Ship. Sure, it boosted its pilot performance to a degree, John had experienced the effect himself, but how much of an effect did the Ship have on Finch?

Take this curve for example. It would significantly reduce their current leg, but Finch announced the lucky find as if it was completely the Ship’s doing while he merely sat in the pilot’s chair. Maybe that was even accurate.

“They say the Universe doesn’t cast dice, I doubt it plays cards, either,” Harold murmured, answering John’s last remark about a jackpot. “Nevertheless, since we are in the Fillo’s solar system now, we can evaluate the situation.”

“Did you receive the first results already?”

“Root did, just this night. Seems quite interesting. Extraordinary, even.”

John raised his brows. “You mean it’s not another nuclear crisis?”

“Statistically speaking, bio-weaponry crises are more common than nuclear,” Harold sighed, “though usually less spectacular. But no, I think we are dealing with a natural catastrophe for a change. Root analyzed the early shots of Fillo and it’s relative position to the host planet and sister moons, and the results are troubling. Please have a look… as soon as you’ve eaten, of course.”

Contrary to the advice, John picked up his plate and walked to the big glass desk, on which Harold usually pinned his computer clippings. He was intrigued. Harold had been in this “business” long before John came along, and if he deemed something interesting, it was definitely a thing worth seeing.

One clipping in particular drew John’s attention. It was a small moving picture, a model of interplanetary gravitation, with several brightly colored balls running on elliptical orbits around each other. 

He had no problem finding Fillo — the only satellite with a transparent atmosphere and water — and he also had no problem seeing that the orbital movements of the small moon were largely distorted. After some consideration he found the culprit: not particularly large but big enough, a shapeless celestial body, circling the host planet on a long, angled orbit.

“Is that thing making Fillo fall in on its host planet?” asked John.

“Fortunately, no. That thing is M647, an asteroid from the outer belt of the solar system,” said Finch. "When M647 got close to our gas giant here, it got trapped in its satellite system. The asteroid is too small to cause Fillo to fall out of orbit. But it’s large enough to ruin the balance between the primary planet, Fillo-Ma, as the locals call it, and its thirty eight satellites. Unfortunately, that disruption is causing extremely large tidal waves on Fillo.”

“Poor bastards are going to be flooded,” John nodded.

“Not only that. Quakes, too, I’m afraid. And since Fillo can barely support its rudimentary space industry, I don’t think the inhabitants will find a solution any time soon.”

“And you will?” John was mildly surprised. “Don’t tell me, the Ship can move the damned asteroid!”

“Mr. Reese, your trust in my abilities is astounding.” Harold smiled a little tensely. “And so are your scrambled eggs. But we need to evaluate the situation before rushing into any drastic measures. Please, finish your breakfast. We have three more days before reaching our current destination.”


	4. Chapter 3

**Year 3747 Key time**

Saving planets?

“Bullshit,” Reese said to the little glowing sphere.

“An understandable reaction,” the chilly voice admitted. “Would you be more amenable to consider my proposal if I liberated you from your unfortunate predicament?”

“Sure, I suppose you’ll use some magic ray or something to ‘liberate’ me…” Reese started.

“Please try your chains, if you would be so kind,” said the voice.

Mentally preparing the appropriately grim and/or snarky response, Reese tugged at his handcuffs. The chains and the cuffs were good stuff, professional. Something less he would have picked with his own assorted built-in arsenal; but these were just plain old space steel (an euphemism defining the best alloy the Sandorians could concoct). No electronic parts to hack, no mechanic parts to unlock. The cuffs were just welded shut on John. 

As he tugged, they clicked — and opened. Both cuffs just fell apart, leaving two semicircles of black metal floating and rotating very slowly in the dark. The chain tugged at them and rotation stopped.

“How…” Reese began, dumbfounded.

“Invoking molecular memory,” the voice said. “A little trade secret, if you will. Now, do you need any assistance in escaping the prison? I imagine, the construction itself shouldn’t be much of a challenge.”

“Well, I don’t know,” Reese said. “I don’t breathe in vacuum very well, so an escape pod or a shuttle would be nice.”

“You’ll find one at bay six. Please take the communication device with you, they are not cheap.”

Reese grabbed the sphere, half-expecting it to resist the touch or be connected to something. No such thing: it really just sat there, in the air, as anything should in zero G. John was, naturally, stripped naked when taken to the cell, so no pockets, but he had a stomach compartment previously used to store additional ammunition. The device fitted nicely, leaving both of his hands free.

Now, there was a problem with the door. Reese didn't pack a lot of weaponry in his body — weapons weighed you down and were too impractical, especially with the galactic companies introducing thousands of new shotgun and rifle options every standard year. He did, of course, have several ports and interfaces to connect said rifles and shotguns (and he was tired of the obligatory jokes about unnatural orifices). He was also equipped with a number of tools for delicate work. Reese could pick a lock bare-handed, but the lock on this door was built inside the solid metal plate and managed centrally by the prison’s computer. Which, by the way, must have been hacked pretty thoroughly to not notice Reese’s escape by know.

Also, Reese’s batteries were almost empty and he only had usual human strength at his disposal. Fortunately, human strength had a relative definition. 

Grasping the door frame, Reese delivered a strong blow to the area of the lock. The frame was too narrow for a good grip, so the effort propelled him back a little, and he couldn’t return to the door before he hit the opposite wall and pushed. Grasping the door again, Reese put the fingers of the other hand to the lock area again. 

Useful tools, indeed. He could practically “see” the inner workings of the lock now. His previous punch had shifted the electric receiver a little. Not enough for the lock to malfunction, but enough to give Reese a working chance. He had already dealt with this kind of locks before, exploiting this particular vulnerable spot. 

John tapped the door several times, emulating the unlocking sequence. He fervently hoped nobody had changed the standard sequence or patched the vulnerability. He would pray, if he were a religious person. But the church on his home planet denounced cyborgs, so…

One more tap. A pause, so short a non-augmented human wouldn’t even notice, then three more. And… slowly, with a menacing, rusty screech the door slid aside, showing a long and wide, unbelievably huge octagonal corridor with lots and lots of locked doors. 

John was free. Almost. Next step — bay six.

The prison station was loosely attached to one of the bigger rocks in the asteroid belt of the Karima two-star system. It had oxygen and basic life-support because it also doubled as a penalty assignment for government contractors who committed minor crimes or misdemeanors. These hapless civil servants were tasked with maintaining the prison and some automated scientific equipment. 

Also, not every prisoner here was on a delayed death sentence, like John. Some were counting on serving their term and being released. _Their_ cells were provided with light, oxygen and even automated feeding and waste disposal lines, all of which needed maintenance. That task also fell to the unwilling prison’s crew.

John knew that guards and personnel lived in the same part of the station where, not incidentally, the escape pods and bays were located. He’d never been in this particular prison before, but the layout was both common and logical enough. Meaning, that if his mysterious savior had really hacked the station computer, John would meet no obstacles. The escape was going to be as simple as drifting along the corridor to the isolated part of the station and finding the airlock he needed… _if_ he was able to open the door to that isolated compound.

And the cheap trick he used on the door to his cell was not going to work. That door would definitely be better secured.

John opened the compartment inside his stomach and took out the glowing sphere.

“Hey,” he said to his unknown benefactor, “how about you stop messing with the wiring? I need them to know I’m about to escape.”

The damned ball snorted.

“You think they will be so stupid as to open the door, stick their heads outside and check? They’ll go through automated procedures first, namely open the big gate on the other end and let all the air escape explosively. Including you.”

“Well, not too bad,” John reasoned. “I can exist in vacuum longer than an average humanoid. Ten to fifteen minutes. Enough time for you to catch me?”

“The time may be sufficient, but the speed of your ejection will pose a significant problem. How about we avoid excessive drama,” the voice said dryly, and the door in question softly popped opened.

“That works too,” said John. “So, couldn’t you also open the door to my cell?”

“What would be the fun, Mr. Reese?”

Reese chuckled grimly and returned the sphere inside his stomach cavity. 

After that it was practically a cakewalk. The only difficulty was to adjust to the standard gravity swiftly enough (the zero-grav zone ended on the other side of the door) and not to bump into anybody. Reese was not afraid of such an encounter; he just didn’t want it to get messy. He’d cheerfully break the necks of the people who sent him here, but underpaid and punished technicians, and even the guards, were only doing their jobs. 

Fortunately, he didn’t meet anybody. It was almost anticlimactic.

Bay six had three airlocks, but only one of them was indicated as in use. The door opened when he approached — right inside was an extremely small shuttle. Reese opened the vessel, expecting to find at least two intermediaries: a pilot and a big, looming no-nonsense silent guy, probably also a cyborg, with the sole purpose to enforce Reese’s cooperation if necessary. Instead, in the pilot chair he saw a middle-aged man in very fashionable (or hopelessly outdated, depending on the planet you are on) glasses, with thinning, spiky brown hair and pale complexion typical for a spacer. 

He spoke in the same precise, cultured voice Reese heard through the sphere. “Glad you made it, Mr. Reese.”

“Who are you?” Reese asked, plopping into the second chair. “You’re not afraid to haul yourself in this can with me?

The pale man immediately started the launch sequence, expertly bringing the small shuttle off the station.

“Sorry for my manners. Indeed, I should have introduced myself from the beginning. You can call me Mr. Finch. And no, I’m not particularly afraid of you.”

“Then you are insane,” Reese blurted.

“Well,” Mr. Finch smiled fleetingly. “It’s not a very original reply, but such a state of mind is a job requirement.”


	5. Chapter 4

**Chapter 4**   
**Year 3751 Key time**

“Mmm, you know Harry thinks that bio-hazard extinction happens more often than nuclear?” asked Root in a bored tone, painting her nails. “Can’t really agree. You know I respect him tremendously, but that’s just plain wrong.”

“Uh-huh,” drawled Shaw. “Why so? I mean, guys, I haven’t been with you that long, but I saw four bio-alerts and only one nuclear…”

“When I started working with Harold, it was almost exclusively nukes,” John shrugged. “Three in a row. The first one was somewhat unusual, though. They tried to bomb a neighbouring planet into extinction, not themselves.”

“Ah, I remember them!” Root blew on her thumb and critically examined it. “It’s how I met you, John. You were keeping up extraordinary well for a bio-brain, I was almost impressed.”

“We beat you that time,” said John. He gave up trying to understand why Root was poking him, a cyborg, with that bio-brain dig but never bothered Harold. John saw his X-ray scans and was sure Finch didn’t have an artificial bone in his body, leave alone organs.

“You still don’t understand what my game even was, Johny,” Root smiled patronizingly. “But I’m not offended in the least.”

The three of them were sitting at the round table in the galley, in the circle of warm yellow light from the antique lamp above. Nominally it was called ‘a tactical conference’, but in reality John figured they all just had nothing else to do. It’s not like they all liked each other that much; but one way or another, you can’t spend all the evenings in your quarters by yourself. People need company. Even if they are not, strictly speaking, people. (Well, Shaw was a Sandorian, therefore, a humanoid, therefore, she counts; John and Root — not so much.)

Also, they didn’t have anybody in whole universe but each other. Harold Finch’s small circle of lost souls. They may as well talk a little — socially. Occasionally, Harold also took part in their conversations, although not as frequently as John would prefer. Right now Finch was busy somewhere in the deep belly of the Ship — some computer adjustments, as he said. Reese didn’t doubt for a second that Harold vastly preferred his tinkering to any polite (or impolite) society.

“Anyway, that time John mentioned I almost orchestrated a double nuclear extinction,” Root continued. “And, I have to admit, it’s rather difficult to make someone push the button. Something about this whole ‘mutual destruction’ idea really chills people off. Bioweapons are easier. First, it’s almost impossible to prove who released a virus and that it wasn’t some natural mutation. It gives the government that starts the extinction some plausible deniability. Second, they have the illusion that they can call it back any minute, release the cure… So they are easier to commit.”

“Well, they can administer a cure mid-plague, actually,” said John. “Or employ defensive measures.” (He saw it done on his homeworld after the Mechinos attack, but he was not going to tell Root this.)

“Exactly what I mean,” Root made a grimace. “So, if you’re into genocide, the overall results of bio-weapons are more promising, in the sense that there are more kills. But total extinction is less likely.”

“Well, I heard about Purple Spheres…” said Shaw. “They say, the virus they contained killed three systems.”

“And has anybody seen the ruins?” Root asked. “You know, pics or it never happened otherwise. Besides, the legend of Purple Spheres is closely connected to the Earthians, and they are nothing but myth.”

“I’ve seen an abandoned Earthian base,” said Reese.

“Sure you have,” Root said very sweetly and condescendingly. “You know that every race that went to space eventually had this legend about an almighty Predecessor race? They were giants walking among the stars, travelling faster than light, extinguishing galaxies and manipulating space and time?”

“Also pissing gold and heavy metals,” Shaw smirked. “All right, we get your point. It’s all comfort fibs. But how about this stuff?” She knocked on the tabletop.

“Yep,” Reese nodded, amused. “The Ship. Harold as good as told me he stole it from some ancient Earthian dockyard. And, as I recall, you almost worshipped it.”

“Oh, I can worship it all right.” Root smiled. “It’s perfect.” Her voice briefly acquired a reverent quality. “And Harold built it. I don’t know why he lied to you, maybe it’s his misguided sense of modesty. But there were never any mighty ancients. There are only, once in a long while, some brilliant minds. Lonely brilliant minds scattered across the universe.”

Her brown eyes were chilly despite their warm hue. She clearly thought herself one of those “lonely brilliant minds”. John was the last person to argue with her in this regard: her madness definitely didn’t need more fuel. About the other matter though...

“How could Harold create something so enormous and complex as the Ship?” John asked. “You can’t build a ship all on your own. You need docks, at the very least, you need an industry.”

“And for something like this Ship you need a whole freaking planet,” Shaw agreed.

“Oh yes.” Root smirked, “and I presume, you know what planet Harold is from?”

Reese and Shaw exchanged looks. They both, John knew, had tried their best to dig out Harold’s roots at every opportunity. They’d both failed. But, to be fair, those opportunities were scarce: the number of populated planets was virtually uncountable, and no reliable registers were ever created. Harold was humanoid, that’s for certain, but that didn’t narrow the field much.

Seizing the pause, Root added. “Really, Sameen, I’d be so glad to agree with you on this little theory! But if the Earthians had indeed existed and this Ship really had belonged to them at some point, Harold would have never been able to sort out her controls. She‘d be far too superior to everything we know. A good technician can jump over, maybe, two or three generations of technical development. But something like a billion year of independent evolution? Not a chance. I know engineering.”

‘Huh’, thought John. He’d been so sure… But Root had definitely made a valid point.


	6. Chapter 5

**Year 3747 Key time**

John would think that flying in the little shuttle was the same as launching himself into space in a tin can. And to some degree it was every bit as uncomfortable it seemed to be. But the vessel proved itself surprisingly fast. As indicated the shuttle’s controls, in only ten minutes they were so far from the prison that even the best search radars wouldn’t find them.

And in half an hour they saw the mother ship. 

First it appeared on their radar, then — on the screens. It was gigantic. The tiny shuttle was no more than a little speckle compared to its enormous, reflective form: the ship practically shone. It was so bright that you couldn’t see stars nearby. John had his fair share of serving governments who, in transparent attempts to overcompensate, commissioning ships bigger and nastier than anything else in the known universe, but he’d never seen anything quite like this.

This thing would dwarf the linear Arati cruiser, class “Dragon”, and that was saying something.

Also, the ship seemed clearly put together by a genius and haphazardly at that.

At first sight John though it looked like a snowflake. It was an overly complex symmetrical structure, made of a compound which gave it an unusually high albedo. 

Then the ship turned, and Reese saw that he was completely wrong. He'd erroneously mistook its structure for something with a semblance of order. At a closer distance the ship looked like a heap of random, if very high-tech, household appliances, strewn together by one big spiderweb. These were the long thin lines John thought to be an outline of a snowflake and they were as far from order as possible.

“Impressive,” he said breaking their tense silence. “Is this your base of operation?”

“Pretty much,” Finch answered. “If you don’t mind I’d prefer you getting dressed before coming aboard. You will find the clothes in the container behind your chair.”

“Is your captain very formal, Mr. Finch?” asked Reese, drawing unnecessary emphasis to the “mister”. 

“Merely a desire to start this endeavour in a proper fashion,” was the tight response.

Said clothes turned out to be a jumpsuit, black and silver, very soft to the touch. John had no idea what material it was made of, but it clung to him like a second skin. Getting it on in the cramped space of the shuttle cabin required some impressive acrobatics.

“There is an emergency battery you can use on the shuttle to recharge your system, if necessary,” Finch advised, “but if it’s not urgent, it may be more convenient to use an outlet aboard the ship.”

“I’ll wait,” said John. “So. Who are you? What is this monstrosity?” he gestured to the screen, where the ship was gently spinning. “And what is the job you put so much effort in recruiting me for? What is this saving planet gig?”

“We’re almost there. Please, wait, and I’ll explain everything to the best of my abilities.”

John waited. The situation grew stranger and stranger by the second. Who could have built such a thing? Some secluded and advanced civilization nobody had heard of? A well-funded private (cue: terrorist) organization? Some mighty secret service of a big conglomerate of planets? A pirate ring?

Meanwhile, the shuttle docked, which only increased John’s uneasiness, because there didn’t seem to be any receptacle on the smooth surface of the enormous ship. Or, more precisely, there hadn’t been: a diaphragm-like opening appeared just as the shuttle — with its thrusters shut-off — floated by close enough. Then they were practically sucked inside by the ship itself, without any more piloting on Finch’s part. The bay they docked in appeared, after all, to be ordinary-looking.

“We’re home,” Harold declared, promptly switching off the shuttle system. “Or, rather, I’m home, and you’re where you choose to be.”

“Not another prison then?” asked John softly, unstrapping himself from the chair.

“Unlikely. I have neither desire nor ability to keep you here against your will.”

The bay was, indeed, quite standard, exactly like it looked on the screens. A bit on the smallish side — definitely smaller than one might expect on a ship this size. Too many open pipes and control devices in plain sight lent the place a retro look, contrasting with the futuristic exterior.

What’s more strange, John didn’t feel any smells. The spaceships are notoriously smelly, there is no way to build a proper ventilation in space. But the air here seemed almost sterile.

“Please, follow me,” Harold beckoned, inviting John through a hatch into a narrow corridor, which also had a definite hundred-year-old look. John was almost tempted to look for rust.

Harold picked up on his surprise. “A bit out of fashion, perhaps,” he said, “but you need to understand that the inner space is very constricted. There is barely enough room for living quarters for a small crew, forty or fifty people at most, if they don’t mind bunking in close proximity.”

“Why?” asked John. “What do you need all the space for?” At a glance, the ship looked like she could house a small army.

“This and that,” Finch answered evasively. “You’ll see.”

“And how many crew are on the ship now?”

“At present, only two,” Finch looked at him with apparent irony, “if you count yourself one of them.”

“I still don’t understand what it is that you do.”

“We are almost there.”

They had to go through several hatches. John tried to memorize the layout to the best of his abilities, but he couldn’t understand where they were heading despite all his efforts. The shape of the ship was too complicated for him to analyze directions with any accuracy.

An unpleasant thought occurred to him: up to this moment he was relatively sure that he could always knock Finch down and escape; the only thing stopping him was that he didn’t really have any place to escape to. Anyway, Finch was not a physical threat.

But suddenly he understood that if he had to resort to drastic measures, he would in all likelihood be trapped here. It’s not that he wasn’t trapped before, several lighthours away from the nearest planet; a distance you couldn’t cover in any lifepod. But now he practically felt the trap with his skin, human senses and augmented sensors alike.

“Please don’t think there is anything threatening you here, Mr. Reese,” Harold said, still keeping in front of John and not turning his head to him. “If you don’t attack first, that is.”

“I don’t see any weapons on you,” said John.

“I’m afraid, the whole ship is a weapon. And she will gladly use everything to defend her pilot.”

John thought as much.

“What do you call her?”

“The ship. There is really no need for names, she is a one and only. Please, come in.”

Harold opened the last hatch, and Reese found himself in a library.

The walls were lined with shelves, and the shelves were crowded with books of all kinds. Big and small, classical standard (hard cover, pages, opened from right to left) and less common options: scrolls, tablets, spheres covered with runic letters…

Of course it was not a library, though that was the first thing that came to mind. It was a large and well-equipped bridge, which once had been the domain of navigators and several pilots along with other support crew. In the very center, before the wide crescent screen, was the captain’s chair. But the glorious time of the fleet command had long passed and since then the bridge had been… Vandalized, thought Reese, was not the right word. Repurposed.

Most of the working stations had been removed, leaving just three matching chairs. They looked to be designed with the humanoid form in mind, but were slightly too big for most of the species John knew. Second, the consoles circling the bridge were cut open, the cables and cords extended and neatly arranged to adorn the central console.

Following the direction of his gaze, Finch explained: “I modified it a bit, to be able to manage the Ship with a smaller crew. The system is built to be self-sustaining and highly automated, it practically manages itself.”

“So why build a big bridge on the first place?” Reese asked.

“Why, do you think?” Finch’s face was unreadable. 

“I think it was a man-of-war once. Or at least one intended for war.”

It was a safe assumption with a ship this size: either war or planetary mining. But a planetary mining vessel was basically a device capable of destroying the outer layers of planetary mantia; so, a war ship either way.

This particular ship didn’t resemble anything war-like at all now. Books, of all things! Certainly, John was familiar with the concept of a book. His native planet, as most of them were, was a peculiar mish-mash of advanced areas and rural backwaters. The paper books, therefore, were represented by two similar but very distinctive species: classy and heavy designer editions with intricate covers, pieces of art for the wealthiest, and cheap paperback editions for those who couldn’t afford electronic devices. 

John was acquainted with both incarnations. He grew up as a city boy in a rather well to do family and was used to everything electronic, but after the Mechinos bombings what was left of his family (he and his older sister) was relocated to the country. There, John had to study with outdated non-interactive paper textbooks which he grimly despised. Why anybody would decide to spend his life surrounded by books was beyond him. Even as an investment books were better off on shelves, never opened.

But these particular books were not an investment: too different, too old, and obviously well-read. John could see the dog-ears, the wrinkled covers… They looked like refugees, not like coveted, freshly-bought items. Some looked downright ancient, he couldn’t recognize the alphabets on at least half of the spines. And John thought he had been places.

“Your hobby?” he asked, waving around noncommittally.

“My necessity,” Finch said grimly. “In due time, I’ll show you. Let me start with a little backstory...”

He came to the main console and touched something. John had a keen eye for small technical manipulation but he couldn’t quite catch what Harold did. And at the same time the light in the chamber dimmed, and… 

John’s first assumption was that the walls and everything else on the bridge became transparent. John’s second — and more correct thought — was that he was inside a hologram, though the definition was unusually high. The illusion of a walk in outer space was absolute. John and Finch were suspended in the dark, surrounded by billions of stars.

“Do you know how many planets there are in just our double galactic system?” asked Finch in a teacher’s tone.

“A hell of a lot,” John answered honestly. “I doubt anyone counted.”

“Exactly,” Finch nodded. “According to the roughest estimation, about several billion, if we count only the ones we know something about. That is, ones that have civilizations advanced enough to send signals into space. There are several central, shall we say, empires or conglomerates, for lack of a better term, who regularly attempt to make contact, or at least count, the new worlds, but mostly nobody cares for them. And do you know how many civilizations go extinct or how often?”

Reese shook his head.

“About one every month. Some due to their own negligence, some due to cosmic causes. And sometimes helping such civilizations may be as easy as introducing them to a technology, very simple, but new to them. Or sometimes they need a little push in the right direction. These are the worlds which I have made my area of interest.”

“So, you’re trying to convince me you can help an entire planet?” John asked incredulously. “One man with… what? A God complex?”

“Well, since you mention that,” Finch said, “do you know the mythological distinction between gods and heroes? Heroes are usually mere mortals who undertake a god’s task, stealing or otherwise procuring god’s instruments. Ultimately they perish, but sometimes they manage to do something good before their demise. In other words, more of a hero complex.”

And, despite himself, John couldn’t suppress a wide smile.


	7. Chapter 6

**Year 3751 Key time**

“They are basically just out of their caves,” Shaw said incredulously. “How can they plan to fight a freaking Armageddon?”

“That’s not an entirely accurate description, Ms. Shaw,” Finch said.

The four of them were already on the bridge, or, how Root preferred to call it, “command center”, looking at the first data analyses from Fillo.

“Well, they pretty much rely on beastpower and steam. How is that even possible?”

“They, indeed, have a peculiar economic system. Most of the population is dispersed, concentrated in small villages and towns that are scattered across the habitable land masses. There are, however, several advanced cities, that became the centers of more or less defined zones… You can call them countries, I suppose, though they lack official borders save the border of a city itself. These cities are technologically advanced enough to have trade relationships with a few of the neighboring solar systems, though they don’t build their own spaceships. Or rather, the spaceships they build are not safe enough for anything more than system-wide browsing.”

“And how are these trade relationships going to help them?” John asked.

“Obviously, silly, they are going to buy something,” Root drawled, playing with her hair. “You should pay attention in class.”

John fought the urge to roll his eyes. Root digs didn’t even bother him anymore. Well, they’d bothered him once — when he was vehemently against Harold’s idea of taking on an obviously unstable cyborg slash android (Root preferred to call herself an android though she had more human parts than Reese himself; and he felt, with her artificial brain, she was pretty much entitled to). But since then, Root had proved her worth. She had saved Harold’s life once and she had yet to leave John without backup. Because of that, he was prepared to put up with her bitching for a while. Until she crossed the line, anyway, which, despite coming close, she never did.

Harold shot Root a glare. She smiled winningly; maybe she nagged John just to rattle Harold? Reese never really got their relationship, and that was what bothered him more than anything she ever said to him. Root wasn’t a danger to Harold, but she could be a risk.

“Indeed, they tried to close a deal with the Arati’s concern, called Senterfield,” said Harold. “But not for sale. They wanted a… lease.”

“Lease? On a weapon?” asked Reese. “And how do you know this?”

“I managed to pick up some of their negotiations on the radio. They want to rent a “Star Giant” class planet miner.”

“The one that is a joke on a non-military vessels classification?” Shaw asked sharply. “A planet destroyer?”

“Exactly.”

“But if they break this stray moon to pieces, wouldn’t be the mass still there?” John asked. “It’s not going to do them any good.”

“No, they want to push it to Fillo-Ma, I think. That plan would make more sense, at least,” Finch frowned. “Although I’m not sure I managed to grasp all the details.”

“So what’s the problem then?” it was Shaw’s turn to ask. “If they have already figured it out, why do they need us?”

“That I don’t know yet,” Harold admitted, “but you know that the Ship never takes us to the planets that have it covered. There has to be some catch.”

“First catch that I see,” John said, “is that Arati are the shrewdest tradesmen there are. I doubt one of Fillo's mega-cities would be able to pay the bill. They’ll probably need to cobble everyone’s resources together, and if there are different countries involved, I can’t see it going smoothly.”

“Astonishingly, you do have a point,” Root admitted. “Senterfield are known vultures, I worked with them for some time. Even if they do agree, they are equally likely to just pocket the resources and fly away.”

“So, first idea is what?” asked Shaw. “Diplomacy again? I’m not good with that, you know…”

“Probably,” said Finch, “Mr. Reese’s first guess is as good as any. There is an obvious difficulty, though. They are not standard humanoid, so we won’t be able to fit in.”

He summoned a picture of the natives on the central console. They were bipedal, with two, four-fingered arms and one head, pretty standard humanoid layout after all, no need to heavily accessorize. Violet, scaly skin and cat eyes were a piece of cake, but forked tongues were not. Maybe with a small holo-projector he could...

“I think I may be able to mimic them with one of your devices,” Reese said.

“I’m afraid five feet would be considered above average height among them,” said Finch almost apologetically. “Barring an emergency, I think Ms. Shaw would do better down there.”

“No problem,” Shaw stretched her arm across the table, and it began to turn violet; little scales popped up on previously white skin. “Especially since I don’t need Harold’s devic-sess,” she hissed as her tongue started to fork, and eyes adopted the distinct golden hue of the natives.

“Oh, I so love you when you do that,” Root murmured.


	8. Chapter 7

**Year 3747 Key time**

“Two questions,” John said.

“Only two?” Perhaps, Finch smiled. Perhaps, not. John suspected one had to be a fine connoisseur of his microexpressions to judge with some degree of certainty when he showed any emotions at all. With his facial stiffness Finch would make a fine tax collector. Or a poker player.

“Two would do for now,” Reese assured him. “First, how do you know when a planet needs your help? Second, how are you going to help at all? This ship is big as hell and probably rigged with enough cannons and missiles to take out a fleet, but you’ll need a small army of your own to make any difference.”

“There is no designated weapon on the Ship,” Finch answered primly. “Some equipment may, however, serve in such a capacity. It proved enough on several occasions. Also, I do not fancy brute force, Mr. Reese. My experience shows that in most cases it’s just the matter of right information on the right time. You do not need an army. You need to know how and where to make the most impact, is all. As I’ve already told you, sometimes you need just to push in right direction.”

“Fine,” John crossed his hands, not convinced, but letting the matter drop for now. “What about the first question? The source of your insider knowledge?”

“It is… somewhat easier to show. Follow me, please.”

Finch opened a door, not the one they came through. Having walked through several twisted, narrow corridors, they found themselves before yet another door with rounded corners and a small window in the middle of it. The window seemed frosted or dusted; John couldn’t tell what was behind it.

“The brain of the Ship,” Finch said, opening the door. “Well, the communication chamber thereof.”

It didn’t look like a brain. It looked like they found themselves inside of a giant ball, awash in bright white and blue light. Disoriented and confused, Reese suddenly felt a surge so powerful he gasped and almost lost his balance. The intake of energy was so massive he’d practically choked on it, had his mech part worked that way. His batteries came to life, charging steadily and much faster than they normally would, which seemed almost uncomfortable.

Then John realized that he and Finch were inside a polyhedron, not a ball, only each facet was so small the whole structure looked more like an inner surface of sphere. Each facet reflected light from the single source — a big, angrily vibrating white-hot and blue lightning bolt, suspended in the air in the dead center. Flashes and specks danced around, almost painful to the eyes. The ozone smell was overpowering.

With his batteries charging, John’s acute artificial senses started coming to life one by one. He could “see” now that the room was full not only of light but of charged radiowaves — lots and lots of them. No wonder his batteries were charging. No radiation, though. He didn’t think it was dangerous for him or Finch to be here. He didn’t think he even remotely knew what technologies were employed to make something like that possible.

“This Ship is unique,” said Finch. “One of a kind. I’ve never came across any vessel like her and I doubt such a design is possible. It is million years ahead of anything being built today.”

“How did you come to own this thing?” Reese said with forced nonchalance.

“I found it,” said Finch. “I believe it’s Earthian technology. It took me more than decade to explore just the sliver of its abilities.”

“Earthian, no kidding?” Reese made an attempt to smirk, but mostly just swallowed. “And here I thought your story about helping planets was far-fetched enough…”

“As you, no doubt, know,” Finch cut him short, “space is full of all kinds of radiation. Light, X-rays, gamma-rays, charged particles, including neutrinos, etcetera. There was a man once who said that if you could wholly comprehend just one tiny particle, randomly flying past you, you could fully comprehend the whole Universe.”

“I heard something like this,” Reese allowed. “What of it?”

“That’s exactly what this ship does. It gathers all the stray radiation wandering across the universe, all the emissions from the distant stars, the gravitational waves, analyzes them and forms a prediction. It can paint a picture of the Universe as it was, as it is and as it is going to be. And, incidentally, it is able to point this ship towards a star or a planet that can use our help.”

Reese chuckled. It sounded beyond fairytale. It sounded downright childish, unbelievable. This Finch character was shady at best, pursuing his own hidden agenda, and completely insane at worst. Even if he told the truth, even if the Ship was capable of something so tremendously powerful, who in their right mind would put this might to the task of aiding poor and obsolete worlds, still dragging through their variations of Dark Ages?

The most logical thing for Reese to do was to take Finch hostage right now and to make him set the course to the nearest inhabited planet… Or, possibly, the second nearest one, since the closest was Tschena, the planet that convicted him.

“It’s a lot to take on your word alone,” said John instead, because if he had always done the most logical thing, he would have never been in this mess to begin with.

“It is,” Finch agreed. “If you kindly come here and put your hands there, you’ll see what I mean.”

He pointed to the nearest area of the wall surface, where several facets turned dark, almost black, seemingly at his command. John walked there and suddenly found out that gravitation in here didn’t work the way he assumed; he and Finch hadn’t been on the “floor” or on the bottom of the giant sphere. Wherever John went was the bottom he now looked at Finch standing on “the wall”. A similar effect happens when gravity is created by rotating a ship of a space station instead of good old artificial G, but John never saw it working on such a small scale. You usually prefer to rotate something at least a hundred meters in diameter — it demanded less rotation speed, therefore took less power and was ultimately cheaper.

He walked to the dark patches, squatted and gently put his hand on one, immediately feeling the strangest sensation. His eyes, using both human and artificial sensors, couldn’t see anything unusual in these facets. They were just dark spots on the otherwise shiny surface. But the skin on his fingertips…

It was like watching a movie with his hands, which was exactly what it was, he thought. An entirely dreamlike, peculiar feeling. He just saw it: himself on the hospital bed, and Jesse crying in the visitor’s chair, the sun slanting through a high, half-opened window. He even felt the odor of wet dirt and grass; it was a sunny day, or early evening, more accurately. They had given him a choice the day before, of either being a cyborg or taking a disability discharge. He chose the first option, and he said to Jesse he never wanted to see her again.

“You want me to leave?” she asked angry, defiant, her chin trembling a little and her mouth in an awkward line. “Then you should hit me. You need to beat me up, physically, because otherwise I’ll never believe you don’t…” she couldn’t finish.

And John was so angry, so in pain, and every word she spoke hurt him like a white-hot needle of a torturer, that he thought for a second that he could — not really, because he would have broken her bones, but just a slap, or grabbing her neck, to make her feel how damn well serious he was and how she only made it worse. But an urge passed. His father, when he was alive, taught him to never hit a woman, no matter how they tell you one needs to “teach” his wife or his fiancee. Later John adjusted that rule to exclude combat situation with trained professionals. But Jesse Lat, his childhood friend, wasn’t one of them, even though she was crushing all what was left of his defenses with terrifying ease.

“Leave,” he said looking into her eyes. And she did. 

He never answered her calls. He disappeared from her life, from whatever future they had together. He thought he did it for her; nobody in their surroundings would understand or support her marrying a cyborg, even her own mother. She was young, bright and beautiful, she dreamt of becoming a doctor, but she’d never find a good job with such a liability. And the prospect of raising children with this social stigma was more terrifying than facing a dozen Mechinos plazma cannons. 

Of course, he could choose prosthetics that didn’t include massive “biological redevelopment”, as they called it. But that way John would never been able to fight again, to serve and to protect; and he thought his world needed him. 

John blinked away tears in his eyes. Then his grief ebbed. Rage, red and potent, came up instead. It was aimed at Finch, at his charades, at the very fact that the little man (a good head shorter than him) dared to save him when John was sure everything was over at last and he didn’t have to care anymore.

His muscles tensed; he turned around menacingly, reading himself to the jump. He almost felt Finch’s neck under his fingers. He’d grasp, and press, not enough to kill, but enough to make him gulp for air, to see the primal understanding of the victim-prey relationship in that fishy eyes…

He stayed. Breathed in. Breathed out.

“I’m truly sorry,” Finch said very solemnly. “You couldn’t help your fiancee. I also lost someone. Very long ago. It’s too late for them and for us, too. But maybe it’s not too late for someone else out there. Will you help me?” 

John thought he heard desperation behind Finch’s controlled tone. “Let’s have a trial run,” he said.


	9. Chapter 9

**Year 3751 Key time**

People believe, if they give the matter any thought at all, it’s virtually impossible to infiltrate a ship in deep space. After all, haven’t the crew spent so much time together that they have probably counted the hairs on each other’s forearms? There is no way a stranger can just waltz in through an airlock, even assuming that this stranger can hide their breach from the ship security sensors.

But the reality is, as always, more complicated. If the ship is big enough and belongs to a military or corporate organization, most of the time her crew will be on rotation. Their schedule is tightly regulated and most of them are well acquainted only with the people from their own department and the departments they intersect with, provided they have matching shifts. An engine technician may never meet any of ship surgeons if he’s healthy and certainly will never meet a pilot, unless in a bar after the flight; a security officer will meet most of the crew but may never encounter the captain. Taking into account that the crew of a ship of the line or a big passenger liner is anything between 200 and 1200 people, it’s not unheard of to meet a new face abroad by the end of a two-year journey.

That was the vulnerability Reese intended to exploit to get himself in the Arati’s monster of a cruiser.

Said ship was orbiting Fillo-Ma at a respected distance from its moon. The vessel was equipped with state of the art long-range sensors, so Finch was forced to park the Ship even further from its destination. Shaw flew Swallow to Fillo, while John opted for Sparrow. The tiny shuttle that Harold had used to bust him out of prison was not only conveniently-sized, but powerful. Sparrow boasted extremely good stealth technology which made her almost invisible. Root was going to come with John to provide him and Shaw technical support, but at the last moment Finch asked: “Root, if you could stay this time. I think I have been away from the field for too long.”

Root looked puzzled and even a bit displeased. “But you hate fieldwork, Harry. Has something happened?”

“Nothing at all,” Harold assured her. “I just don’t fancy the inevitable two second delay in our communications with the Arati’s ship. I want a more hands-on approach this time.”

“Maybe you are right, you shouldn’t neglect your big little friend too much. Aren’t you glad, John?” asked Root sweetly, and John did his best to visibly ignore her.

The truth was, he was pleased. He liked Finch’s company, perhaps too much for his own emotional safety. He was looking forward to several hours trapped in a tight cabin with him. And what’s better, he could allow himself to feel pleasure. It was not going to lead anywhere, not like with Jesse.

Besides, Harold’s reasoning was a little touching. Last time, due to a similar two-second delay in intel, John ended up wounded, bad enough to require Harold’s skills. Even though the application of those skills proved to be surprisingly enjoyable for John, Harold himself looked conflicted, even miserable afterwards. He worried too much, John decided. But nevertheless, his reaction was pleasant. John didn’t doubt Harold valued him, not only as a useful associate but as a personal connection, maybe even a friend. Harold proved as much on different occasions, but John was absolutely sure his feelings were not even close to the tremendous regard he came to hold Harold in. It was nice to see his own affection almost returned, even in the form of fear for John’s life.

“Please, Root, remember, that this time your main task will be not tactical input, but rather more background information,” Harold said, when they were preparing Sparrow before launch. They were both in pilot seats, John checking orbits programmed in the navigational system and Harold running last minute diagnostics. “Fillos’s dignitaries are flying to negotiate with the Arati.The plan is for Ms. Shaw to replace one of their staffers. Preferably a bodyguard, someone who doesn’t have to talk much.”

“Please, Harry, give Shaw some credit,” Root reproached him in both their earpieces, “she can pretend to be sweet if she wants to. And since you uploaded her with Fillo’s main language, she won’t have any problems with that.”

“Oh, I’m not afraid about her lack of communication skills,” Harold said absentmindedly, checking the emergency ejection systems. “I’m more worried about her creative application thereof. And for the tenth time, please. I didn’t upload the language and social-relevant knowledge in Ms. Shaw’s head, she doesn’t have electronic extensions as you do. The system I used recreates recognition patterns in the brain, using…”

“Harold,” John chuckled. “You hypnotised us and uploaded the data in our brains, that’s what you did.”

“Thank you for your input, Mr. Reese,” Harold said, “I don’t like the notion of myself altering people’s minds, and that’s not what has happened here.”

John dropped the subject. Harold tended to get touchy when it came to brain matters; also to artificial intelligence. John wondered if there was some history here.

“Initiating launch,” Harold said at last. “Going out.”

John could never really get used to it: there were no bay doors which opened and let them out of the hangar, none of the usual lighting and alerts warning that the airlock was about to open. Instead, a hole appeared in the bay wall right in front the nose of Sparrow, and she glided silently and gracefully in the endless night.

“I hope, we will reunite with Ms. Shaw shortly, but if it doesn’t happen, your task is to support her, not us,” Harold said to Root while doing little adjustments to send Sparrow to the most economical orbit to catch the Arati. “She should arrive aboard Arati’s mining ship together with the mission. Her task is to infiltrate the delegation, and then we will work together to make the deal happen.”

The Ship was falling back behind the Sparrow’s stern incredibly fast, bright and enormous on the main screen, but she was still in the range for real time communications and Root’s voice carried without delay.

“I told you, the deal where they rent the mining ship to drive the M647 on the gas giant is almost impossible.” Root said with exaggerated patience. “Senterfield is law-abiding enough for a corporation, but they follow only the laws of the Great Arati Federation, which don’t protect other planets’ interests. Oh, they try to maintain their image of fair traders, but Fillo is small, unimportant and far from main trade routes. Which makes it absolutely alright to screw our poor violet friends. Senterfield will take the payment, or the first half of it, whatever the Fillo-natives will offer them, and leave.”

“Very few governments in this Galaxy have laws enforcing proper business conduct with other planets without any interplanetary agreements, and fewer still follow them,” said Harold curtly. “That’s nothing new. We’ve faced Senterfield before. I think that is exactly the reason why the Ship took us there. There is no way this deal can go smoothly, that’s why we are here to insure it.”

“Good luck with that,” said Root. “But I think you should let _me_ try.”

“I’m also aware of your methods,” Harold answered dryly. “Frankly, I’m more comfortable with how Mr. Reese is dealing with things.”

John felt a little tremble of delight at those words, somewhere deep inside, where he didn’t let anything warm in a decade. 

“And how do you suggest we deal with things, Mr. Finch?” he asked sardonically, to mask the sudden warmth. 

“Why, as always, Mr. Reese,” said Harold. “You find the authorities in charge, I bribe them. Failing that, you threaten them. And Ms. Shaw insures everything goes smoothly on the other side.”

“I’d just knock off the Arati with paralytic gas and hijack their ship,” Root said. “More fun that way.”

“I don’t doubt it,” Harold sighed.

They settled in for the 4.5 hour trip. John was okay in the cramped space, but Harold, as expected, started getting jumpy. John turned off the internal gravity (which was a ridiculous thing to have on a shuttle anyway, but Sparrow was evidently built on the same tech as the Ship and consumed as little energy as a standard powered spacesuite). Without a gravitation vector the little cabin was a bit more spacious. John did some simple exercises to alleviate the boredom and relax the biological muscles and poked Harold into following his example. Then they talked a little. Then Harold slept, and John watched the space around. 

And then they saw the Arati’s ship on the radars; its enormous platform bristling with what looked like an awful lot of guns. “It’s not a mining ship,” said Harold, wide awake in a second.

“It’s a fighter-carrier,” John agreed. “I’d say, class Island, 100 to 150 fighters aboard, 40 plasma-cannons, 14 missile launchers… How come we didn’t see this earlier?”

“I’m trying to determine…” Harold fingers were wild on the sensor keyboard. “Apparently, they not only have very good sensors, but very good masking abilities as well. But why?” He asked, puzzled. “A cruiser this size can take on any planet with a biosphere, if it is unprotected. But who needs Fillo? It’s small, it lacks resources and it’s on the brink of extinction anyway!”

“That’s what we need to find out,” John said grimly.

**Author's Note:**

> I doubt it needs mentioning, but to be on the safe side...
> 
> 1\. It's not a legitimate "hard" SF, it's a space opera, so I took a few liberties with physics. E. g., the story takes place in the future where our Galaxy will have merged with Magellanian Cloud (hence "double galaxy"), which should take place in 4 point something billion years, but I cut it down to several millions, just for the awesomness of it.
> 
> 2\. The dates in the beginning of each chapter do not refer to the Grigorian calendar.


End file.
